Iran’s nukes make news: Who’s deceiving whom?

As diplomats from the so-called P5+1 countries — The United States, Russia, Britain, France, China, and Germany — met yesterday in Switzerland for talks with Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator, the guessing game continues.

The guess is not only about whether Iran is making a nuclear bomb, but also about whether an attack on Iran will take place. Both are possibilities.

Ahead of yesterday’s talks, western diplomats said they hoped the Iranians would engage in constructive dialogue on how to end the long-running standoff over Teheran’s nuclear programme, which, the West claims, is aimed at making a bomb that could threaten world security.

The talks came ten days after Iran informed the International Atomic Energy Agency that it was building a second nuclear facility in the holy city of Qom. The announcement, needless to say, agitated the West, which accused Iran of not being honest about its nuclear programme. A controversy also surrounds the announcement. More about this later.

Thursday’s talks also took place against the backdrop of Russia’s qualified support to US moves aimed at bringing fresh sanctions on Iran.

However, an Obama administration official told journalists on Wednesday that the US would not threaten Iran with fresh sanctions at the one-day talks in Geneva. “This is the engagement track, not the pressure track,” he said.

The official, however, warned that the US would pursue sanctions against Iran if it spurns proposals at diplomatic level.

So the never-ending diplomatic sabre-rattling continues — with the West issuing warning after warning while Iran conducts frequent long-range missile tests sending warnings to Israel and the US. Meanwhile, Iran also offers explanations and insists that its nuclear programme is not in contravention of the statutes of the IAEA.

It appears that both Iran and the West are filibustering or stretching out the dialogue process till they achieve their objectives. In this effort, each side is trying to mislead or outfox the other.

Iran’s moves centre on claims that its nuclear programme is not weapons-oriented. It takes calculated measures and makes timely announcements aimed at defusing the US-Israeli-inspired tension over its nuclear programme. These steps and announcements are so meticulously planned that they not only keep the UN Security Council divided but also give little room for the West to build a solid case against Iran. The West’s case against Iran is largely based on conjecture.

Teheran’s immediate objective, if one were to believe its version of the story, is to enrich uranium to generate nuclear energy. After it achieves this target, production of weapons- grade uranium may or may not take place. But political realism is all about enhancing one’s power. Thus it is naïve to believe that Iran, once it succeeds in producing energy-grade uranium, would not go for weapons-grade uranium — which is a few centrifuges away.

The filibustering of the West involves keeping Iran’s nuclear programme on the world agenda. Although the West has so far failed to come up with concrete evidence to show that Iran is making a bomb, it continues to make allegations. By repeating these allegations, the West is trying to make the world believe that Iran is a threat to global security.

This drama may continue until the United States develops tactical nuclear weapons capable of destroying facilities 300 feet underground. These weapons once developed would not give Iran a chance to strike back.

The US has also begun to deploy anti-missile weapons, including Patriot missile batteries, in countries and American bases close to Iran. These anti-missile weapons are already in Israel. The US is also planning to install them in Turkey.

The US is also modifying its warships in the Gulf to enable them to carry missile defence systems. This came to light when Russia, in response to a US decision to scrap missile defence systems in Poland and the Czech Republic, warned against the deployment of such warships in waters that Moscow considers its backyard.

Many analysts believe that behind all the diplomatic talks and threats of UN sanctions lies a sinister plan to attack Iran. The lies and propaganda with which the West misleads the world are only a prelude to this attack.  Now who says that the Obama administration will not resort to the type of deception that the George W. Bush administration had resorted to in selling the Iraq invasion to the gullible American people?

The Obama White House may not be telling lies, but its deception lies in its failure to tell the truth or acknowledge the truth with regard to Iran.

What is missing in the Obama administration statements is an acknowledgment that Iran, as a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treay (NPT), has opened its nuclear facilities for IAEA inspection.

Also missing is an acknowledgment that the IAEA has so far found no evidence that Iran has diverted enriched uranium to make nuclear bombs — a fact IAEA itself has repeatedly stated.

Washington also refuses to note that Iran has complied with the IAEA requirements and is legally permitted to pursue a peaceful nuclear programme.

The Americans would also not acknowledge that last week’s announcement by Iran that it was building a second nuclear facility in Qom was also in conformity with the IAEA requirements. The West, however, says Iran’s announcement came soon after the US, Britain and France exposed the Qom facility. Obama claimed that Iran had been caught with a secret nuclear-bomb-making facility. The Western media simply parroted these claims as if they were the truth.

A little bit of homework by these media groups would have revealed that Iran informed the IAEA on September 21, four days before the West’s so-called exposure.

The Obama administration also conveniently forgets that on December 3, 2007, a vital declassified intelligence report prepared by the National Intelligence Estimate, had said that Iran had “halted its nuclear weapons programme in 2003” and that Iran would not be able to produce a nuclear weapon till 2015. The NIE is a body consisting of 16 US intelligence agencies.

In spite of all these facts that support Iran’s case, the Obama administration continues its military jingoism, using the Bush language — “all options, including the military strike, are on table” — and demands Iran should “come clean” about its non-existent nuclear weapons programme.

The Obama administration, like the Bush administration, also does not say a word about the nuclear weapons Israel is said to possess.

Not many of the world leaders who gathered in New York two weeks ago had the courage to talk about the nuclear hypocrisy which keeps Israel out of the picture. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was, perhaps, the only exception. He told a news conference that Iran might have the intention to produce nuclear weapons, but Israel already had several hundred operational nuclear missiles and the technology to produce more.

“Israel has nuclear weapons and has used phosphorous bombs against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Why are these not on the agenda? It is always Iran. If only Iran is put on the world agenda, then we may neglect other issues such as the Gaza conflict,” Erdogan said in a remark that matched his Davos outburst two years ago.

As Erdogan points out, selective non-proliferation only underscores the might-is-right principle. If the United States is genuine in its concerns about nuclear non-proliferation and making a just world, it should start with Israel, its staunchest ally. If the US administration adopts one policy for Iran and another for nuclear-power Israel, then Obama has not brought about any changes in US foreign policy to make it a policy based on justice and fairplay.